Health Care Surveys

PURPOSE: Prevalence estimates of healthy behaviors and preventive care among older adults have not received sufficient attention, despite important health benefits such as longevity and better quality of life. Moreover, little is known about general population prevalences of older adults' efforts to change behavior, motivations to improve health behaviors, and perceived barriers to change.

BACKGROUND: Catholic health systems represent a unique sector of nonprofit health care delivery organizations because they must be accountable to institutional pressures of the Roman Catholic Church, in addition to responsiveness to market pressures. Mission statements and values are purported to be the driving force of Catholic institutional identity. Central to the understanding of the Catholic health care delivery sector is the exploration of variation in mission and values statements across the homogeneous field of organizations.

BACKGROUND: Catholic hospitals and health systems comprise a substantial segment of nonprofit, mission-driven, health care services, with accountability to institutional pressures of the Roman Catholic Church as well as economic pressures for solvency. Values are the way in which the organization expresses its faith-based institutional identity, which may used to select services that represent those values.

BACKGROUND: Low utilization of health and nutrition services is a major setback to the attainment of ultimate health of many populations in developing countries including Ghana. Primary health care (PHC) forms the basis for the provision of good quality and sustainable health care and making it accessible to the majority of the population. In line with this, the Catholic Relief Services spearheaded a Development Assistance Programme for the 2004-08 financial year in the northern sector of Ghana. The primary beneficiaries were children in their early years and pregnant and lactating women.

OBJECTIVE: To understand if women anticipate a difference in reproductive healthcare when attending a Catholic institution. STUDY DESIGN: A convenience sample of reproductive-aged women in the Denver metro area completed an online survey. Women were randomized to hypothetical women's health clinics at either a secular or Catholic hospital and asked about expectations for family planning care. Questions covered contraception and management of abnormal or unintended pregnancy. We subsequently assessed provider/site preferences for care. RESULTS: We analyzed 236 surveys.

Advances in Clinical and Experimental Medicine: Official Organ Wroclaw Medical University

BACKGROUND: Patients with at least one chronic disease requiring regular contact with their GP, additional tests and systematic use of medicines constitute one of the challenges for the future of primary medical care. To date, no studies have been published describing the most important factors in increasing the quality of care for the chronically ill. OBJECTIVES: To evaluate correlations between patients' characteristics and their assessments of the quality of health care and to identify the primary factors influencing the quality of care for chronically ill patients.

BACKGROUND: Women born outside Australia make up more than a fifth of the Queensland birthing population and like migrants in other parts of the world face the challenges of cultural dislocation and possible language barriers. Recognising that labour and birth are major life events the aim was to investigate the experiences of these women in comparison to native-born English speaking women. METHODS: Secondary analysis of data from a population based survey of women who had recently birthed in Queensland.

BACKGROUND: To describe the maternity care experiences of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander women in Queensland, Australia and to identify areas for policy and practice improvements. METHODS: A culturally-tailored survey requesting both quantitative and qualitative information was completed by respondents either independently (online or in hard copy) or with the assistance of a trained peer-interviewer.

OBJECTIVE: In order to develop patient-centered care we need to know what patients want and how changing socio-demographic factors shape their preferences. METHODS: We fielded a structured questionnaire that included a discrete choice experiment to investigate women's preferences for place of delivery care in four rural districts of Pwani Region, Tanzania. The discrete choice experiment consisted of six attributes: kind treatment by the health worker, health worker medical knowledge, modern equipment and medicines, facility privacy, facility cleanliness, and cost of visit.